Thursday, July 27. 2006

“We got into Werfen (in Austria), after passing through Germany briefly, last night. We've since discovered a castle and the world's biggest ice caves, so after a day of hiking up and down a mountain we're staying another night.. Obviously I need new feet now! Off for some food now, and search for WiFi!”

Still in Werfen, we intended on visiting the world's largest ice caves, Eisriesenwelt (“world of the ice giants”). We didn't quite know how to drive there, and the first part of the directions we received in German got a little lost in translation.

Scott found what appeared to be a very small one-way street that seemed to go more-or-less where we wanted to go, but we received some strange looks from the locals when we entered it. As we drove down it, the road turned to pebbles, and we passed a few park benches and an oval, finally leading to a real road once squeezing the car through two boulders. It's incredible we fit, and more amazing that we didn't have to reverse all the way back up the hill and out of the “street”.

We got up to the parking for the caves, and decided to hike up the mountain rather than take the funitel. I wasn't really equipped for it, but off we went anyway. It's quite an easy climb, and while Scott was taking several photos, I wound up quite a way ahead of him.

At one point, I hit a fork in the trail, and sent Scott a digital cooee to let him know where I was going. We're on the same mountain, and we're having a chat over SMS — bizarre.

We reached the top and had some lunch at the over-priced restaurant before hiking up the paved road into the caves.

Before entering the cave, you queue outside the entrance (which is sealed to keep the cold inside) in order to group you with your guide. At this stage, you can already appreciate how cold it is inside, because everything feels like the inside of a fridge. When assigned to a group, you're given small oil lamps (because they produce minimal heat) and as the door opens a huge blast of air rushes past — a perfect practical demonstration of thermodynamics!

The caves themselves are enormous and beautiful inside, especially accentuated by the sticks of magnesium burnt by the guide. Scott and I received extra special treatment because we bothered the hike up the mountain, and the guide was quite entertaining. The caves don't seem as cold as you'd expect, and this year was apparently a perfect year for seeing the caves because of the bitterness of the previous winter.

We hiked back down after visiting the caves, and decided to spend a further night in Werfen, returning to Haus Karin. Unfortunately they had run out of rooms, but because we had returned they made sure we could be accommodated by putting us up for the night in their own personal guest room on their side of the house. I have to admit this was an unexpected honour to be trusted in this way.

We spent another night in the village with good food and good grog, unwinding from the fairly physical day we'd had.

We found Internet access in the end, in the form of a tourist information board: a touch screen computer next to the post office where you can change the URL to whatever you want. I'm not entirely sure it was intended for that purpose…

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